Musings on Writing & Life from the Writing Desk Trenches

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Back to Regularly Scheduled Programming…Hopefully

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I’d like to start out by saying that I am, by no means, better or “out of the woods” as so many people like to put it, but I’m going to try to push on. So, here I am.

Since early February, I’ve been doing a lot of personal journal writing and I’ve learned a lot from it. Not only about who I am as a person, a friend, and a writer, but how I try to cope with certain situations in life. I’ve always tried to cope through writing, which is why I went to my journal almost from day one. The journal is written to a “you,” and those of you who I’ve kept in contact with know who the “you” is. Writing it this way allowed me to get my feelings out in an easier way than had I just simply written down what had happened.

Over the last few weeks, I sat down with Louise DeSalvo’s “Writing as a Way of Healing” and read it from cover to cover. She repeatedly stresses that journal writing needs to be approached in a certain way. One must write down the situation exactly as it happened and then we must write down every feeling as a result of the event–how it made us feel when it happened and how we feel about it now. If the situation is ongoing, as mine is, I will continue to write down the things that happen and how I feel about them.

I believe the situation–my situation–has gotten marginally better, which in itself, is something. I don’t know what will happen from here on out. I can’t say for sure that I’ll be back here often, but I am going to try. Not because I want to, but because I have to. Writing, after all, is part of who I am as a person, whether that person is fractured or not. I don’t know if I’ll ever be whole again and the future of this “situation” is certainly uncertain at this point.

I don’t know if it will be reconciled and I don’t know how long it will be until I am back to being myself again. I may end up never being myself again. I could end up being a better me. The thing is, that fact of what I will be is unknown. I’ll keep working toward completion because I promised myself I would, whether it be in my writing or working to understand who I am as a person.